NSA stores data to target any citizen at any time - Greenwald

The current revelations on the NSA’s spying are just the tip of the iceberg and affect “almost every country in the world,” said Glenn Greenwald. He stressed the NSA stores data for “as long as it can,” so they can target a citizen whenever they want.

Glenn Greenwald, the man behind the reports on the NSA global spy
program, spoke to El Mundo journalist German Aranda and stressed
that the US espionage activities went much further than just
Europe.

"There are a lot of countries, and journalists in a lot of
different countries, who have been asking for stories and to work
on documents for a long time," Greenwald said. He added that
he was working as fast as possible to “make sure that all of
these documents get reported in every single country there are
documents for, which is most countries in the world.”

Shedding light on the NSA’s motives in compiling metadata on
citizens, he said the spy organization’s main aim was to store
the information to be able to dip into it whenever necessary.

"The very clear objective of the NSA is not just to collect
all this, but to keep it for as long as they can," said
Greenwald.

"So they can at any time target a particular citizen of Spain
or anywhere else and learn what they've been doing, in terms of
who they have been communicating with.”

‘Preparing the terrain’

Referencing reports leaked from former CIA worker Edward Snowden
regarding the millions of phone calls tapped by the NSA in the
EU, German Aranda stated that French reaction was “important
to prepare the terrain in Spain.”

"With all the countries around Europe and around the world, it
will be the same. The more countries [that] see documents about
them, the more interest the other countries will have to see what
is happening with them," said Aranda.

Last week the Spanish Prime Minister, Manuel Rajoy, summoned the
US Ambassador to account for the reports of spying, echoing the
reactions of France, Germany and a handful of other countries.
Spain has so far resisted calls from Germany to sign an EU
no-spying treaty against the US in the wake of the revelations;
however this may be set to change.

"As in previous occasions, we've asked the U.S. ambassador to
give the government all the necessary information on an issue
which, if it was to be confirmed, could break the climate of
trust that has traditionally been the one between our two
countries," said Spanish Foreign Minister Jose Manuel
Garcia-Margallo, at a joint news conference in Warsaw last week.

In response to European leaders’ furor over NSA espionage, the
White House has launched an internal review into the NSA’s
activities. The EU Parliament has also threatened to halt the
sharing of data on the SWIFT banking system, which provides
information on the transfer of funds by suspected terrorists.

A delegation from the EU parliament is currently in Washington to
discuss what has been described as a “breakdown in trust” between
traditional allies.

The Obama administration earlier said the controversial
intelligence gathering procedures that have attracted
international scrutiny in recent months may require
“additional constraints.” White House spokesperson Jay
Carney said that a “number of efforts [are] underway that are
designed to increase transparency.”